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Paul is one of the Staff Editors at Matthias Media. He is married to Cathy and has three fantastic kids. He loves student ministry, reading, writing music and playing the saxophone, and is looking forward to meeting Jesus face to face.
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Thanks for the encouragement Sandy.
There was an article in the March/April 9Marks Journal by Bob Johnson, called “A Pastors Priorities For Day One” where he mentions the importance of staying and waiting for fruit/growth/etc.
His last point, is - “Plant a tree” - the lesson being to learn to patiently wait and pace yourself.
He closed with a quote from James Boice about how we often over estimate what we can do in a year and under estimate what can be accomplished in 10. Set priorities that will bear fruit in 10 years time - or words to that effect.
As a young pastor (38 y.o.), I confess “guilty” to that charge.
As a teenager, the man who discipled me often used the comparison of an Oak tree and a Paw-paw (papaya to non-Qld’ers). We all want the strength and stability of the Oak in our ministry, but most of us want it in the time it takes to grow paw-paw. God’s ways are not ours!
BTW that 9Marks Journal features an article by Phil Jensen, but the whole Journal is well worth subscribing to / downloading etc.
Al.
Chelsea’s constant turnover of managers and coaches has cost them terribly.
Sandy - should we therefore encourage a default position for guys to go early and stay long?
Al, thanks for the encouragement. And yep, I remember reading that edition of the 9Marks journal and thought it was good. (Click here for a direct link to the PDF.)
I really like the ‘plant a tree’ image and the Boice quote you remind us of.
Michael, thanks for providing the example which proves the difficulty of the opposite (high or regular turnover).
<thickness> I understand and agree with “stay long” but just did not quite get what you meant by “go early” in your proposed default advice.
Go early to college? Go early into pastoral ministry? Go early if you do a big stuff up (but otherwise stay long)? Sorry… Try again can you. </thickness>
sorry -I wasn’t clear - go early to a parish and stay there a long time.
The long term fruit argument means we should encourage guys (in Sydney Anglican context) to get to a parish younger as a rector - rather than have a ‘serial assistant minister’ going through numerous parishes.
Michael, I think there’s a very good argument for long term assistant ministers staying in the same place - not everyone is suited as a senior minister. But agree that there’s generally good reason not to travel through multiple short term assistant ministries (but not always in the Assistant’s control).
Would not want to get too dogmatic about it, but certainly default should staying longer.
Man Utd. have just lost the Champions League final to Barcelona - where the manager is in his first year!
So the moral of the story is ... stick to the NRL Sandy
On a more serious note - I’d agree with the general point that ministry is long-term. We should be encouraging guys to set down roots and grow trees. However, I’d be very wary of making the direct link of ‘godly ministry = a long stay’.
There are a lot of assumptions in ministry about the Pastor being the sole reason for growth, or lack of it. When a guy stays a long time it is much harder work to stop the church being about him instead of about Jesus. I’m not saying this is a reason to leave early, just a potential danger to avoid. I keep reminding myself that the acid test of my ministry is what is left behind <i>after</i> I leave ... even if they have to carry me out in a wooden box.
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